By: Michael Santamaria
There’s little doubt that Business Process Outsourcing is here to stay; the lure of “easy” cost savings is just too powerful for companies to resist. But the truth of the matter is that implementing a successful outsourcing project is hard work and realizing those “easy” savings is by no means a foregone conclusion. While data on outsourcing failure is hard to come by, the Aberdeen Group has reported that 21% of outsourcing projects fail to meet stakeholder expectations, and Gartner puts the outsourcing failure rate as high as 30%. Although neither study defines what constitutes a “failure,” the bottom line is a large percent of projects end with unhappy clients.
Managing Outsourcers: When SLAs Don’t Do the Job
May 1st, 2012By Robert L. Scheier
Service level agreements (SLAs) are the heart and soul of many outsourcing contracts. They define what the provider must deliver and their penalties for failure, in anything from application uptime to the time required to solve a customer’s problem on a help line.
But at least as currently defined, SLAs often fall short of detecting (and, more importantly, correcting) problems quickly. That was the message at the recent SIG Spring Summit from Senior Corporate Counsel Richard English of Ingram Micro and Shaalu Mehra of Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton, who helps the electronic distributor negotiate outsourcing deals.
By Kenneth Hess
No one wants for a relationship to fail but sometimes you have to quit on one that isn’t working. How do you know when to say, “When?”
Relationships are difficult. Band members have creative differences, teammates have ego problems and marriage partners have irreconcilable differences. Likewise, vendors and clients in business-to-business relationships experience all of the pains of band members, teammates and marriage partners. Maintaining a positive relationship is challenging when everything goes well but adding in technological differences, language barriers and time zone disparities has the effect of widening the gap between client and vendor.
Mon Dieu! Montreal’s Tech Entrepreneurs Target Design and Multimedia
April 13th, 2012By Luke Bujarski
Montreal’s recent start-up boom is putting Quebec Province on the map as a social media and cloud-driven innovation hub. What used to be a conservative tech city hosting primarily ‘big’ IT including Research in Motion and Nortel Networks is quickly rebranding itself as a top-shelf start-up ecosystem. Companies like Ateneo Digital, Bespoke Mobility, and Art Sumo are just three of what could soon be global household names sprouting out of Montreal. The tech community in Montreal also draws parallels between Silicon Valley in terms of city size, educational resources, and cultural diversity.
By Heather Littlejohns
Companies seeking to locate new outsourced or shared services centers to offshore or near shore locations typically focus their exploration on factors such as price, local government support and incentives, cultural affinity with the target market, unemployment rates, labor pool, language skills, etc. But are companies really taking the necessary time to explore, assess and discuss their own points of differentiation as they are perceived by the local population?
Customers Make Clear that Outsourcing is About Adding Value
April 4th, 2012
By Robert L. Scheier
As the global economy improves, customers are looking to outsourcers to not only save money, but to drive growth, improve quality and drive innovation.
Those were among the key themes from two days prowling the corridors and break-outs at the Sourcing Interest Group (SIG) spring summit. Speaker after speaker, whether the topic was procurement, category management or macroeconomic trends, described how their employers are trying to use outsourcers not “just” to save money but to make a more strategic contribution.
By Patrick Haller
Andy Wasser, Associate Dean at Carnegie Mellon University, has been instrumental in building the university’s Masters of Information Systems Management, Masters of Science in Information Technology, and the Masters of Science in Information Security Policy & Management programs. These programs have earned the reputation of being the highest ranked graduate level Information Systems programs in the US, and have educated top IT talent from around the world through a unique distance learning methodology that teaches over 200 students a year.
Clients Breaking New Ground with Shared Services Innovations
February 27th, 2012
By Dan Berthiaume
Shared services, or the combining of similar outsourced functions, provide BPO customers the opportunity to create savings and spur improvements in specific areas of the company. However, end users are now going further and are applying shared services across different sectors of the company and using them to get a better analysis of the future, improve their management of human resources, among other solutions.
Creating a Wildly Successful Outsourcing Program
February 24th, 2012
By Linda Tuck Chapman
Outsourcing is serious business and will have a long-term impact on your company’s future. Let’s improve the odds that it’s a positive one! Your customers and shareholders shouldn’t and won’t differentiate who delivers their services – your company or a third party. So the time you invest in planning your outsourcing program and sourcing the right service providers is time well spent.
Examine More Than Cost Savings When Judging the Nearshore
February 2nd, 2012By Patrick Haller
When making sourcing decisions, a lot of attention is paid to the pricing structure and qualifications of service providers, while their actual location is sometimes a secondary consideration. However, when assessing a destination, it’s important to realize that what might be favorable today can morph into a nightmare scenario tomorrow. Don’t be caught unaware and unprepared for the ever-changing dynamics of the Nearshore.
